Re: [legalxml-econtracts] The CSS issue (was .. Req #106)

[Jason Harrop <jharrop@speedlegal.com>]

John

Sorry, but it seems i didn't make myself clear.  Hope the below helps...

>From your question. it appears you
>believe that the document stored at the URL is the official record, and it is in
>a presentation format.  Fine, that correlates to my basic assertion, that the
>document exchanged must be a presentation document.
>
I am happy with the notion that people will sign something they can see.

But that doesn't mean that our standard should prescribe a presentation 
format, much less be crafted around any particular one.

>However, you have been
>arguing forceably that the document you want to be exchanged -- encoded using a
>standard that we are defining -- is one that references an XSL-T stylesheet
>which creates the PDF/.../XSL-FO image. 
>
No.  I have been saying that during negotiations, an XML document 
containing structural (and, if desired, legal) markup can be swapped. 
 No necessary need for presentation here.  Sometimes you might want it, 
sometimes you won't.  I have not argued _at all_ that the exchanged 
document must reference an XSL-T stylesheet, though of course it could.

Once negotiations are complete, the parties will sign a presentation 
format - your final image.  But that could be in any of the above formats.

>Your position seems inconsistent
>with our charter -- to define the standards for a contract, the official record
>..... you don't appear to want to define standards for a contract, but rather you
>want to define standards for something that is used to create the official
>record of the contract.
>  
>
I think the proper role of our standard is to represent the contract in 
XML, in the same way the Court Document DTD represents a court document. 
 See 
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/legalxml-courtfiling/documents/court_document/index.shtml

The Court Document people had no need to be too concerned about how the 
document gets from the XML representation to some presentation image, 
and neither should we.

>Finally, you say you "can't see any justification for elevating CSS above all
>these alternatives" -- suggests to the non-technical audience that this is a
>matter of CSS _or_ XSLT. That is not true at all. Support for CSS does not
>foreclose applying an XSL-T stylesheet to an XML formulated to accommodate CSS
>stylesheets, whether done server-side or client-side, whether outputting PDF,
>RTF, XHTML, SVG, XSL-FO, or something else that _your_ application requires.
>
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But the "support for CSS" which you want goes further.  It says we must 
craft our XML in such a way that CSS doesn't just produce ok output 
(which would happen anyway), but is able to produce high-quality 
printable signable output (if that is possible).

cheers,

Jason

>John McClure
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